


What Is It About Her?

by Awesome_Sauce432



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Episode 85 Spoilers, F/F, Fluff, I'm Deceased Y'all, Jumping Around In The Timeline, Pining, Things That Made Beau Fall In Love With Jester, Vignettes, light angst at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-15
Updated: 2019-11-15
Packaged: 2021-01-31 05:36:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21441082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Awesome_Sauce432/pseuds/Awesome_Sauce432
Summary: "What is it about her?""She's fun, she makes me laugh. I like her ridiculous plans. I think she's complicated and layered... I dunno."Or, the ways Beau fell in love with Jester over many, many months of travel.
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Beauregard Lionett
Comments: 28
Kudos: 205





	What Is It About Her?

_“But what is it about her?” _

_“…”_

_“She’s fun. She makes me laugh.”_

* * *

Beau laid down on her back, feeling the warmth of the sun on her face. They’d finally stopped for a break after a long day on the road heading towards the Labenda Swamp, and she intended to make the most of the brief respite from sitting in a bumpy carriage all day or riding on a horse.

She closed her eyes, only for a distant giggle to catch her ears, and she cracked them open, looking around for the source.

Jester, Nott, and Molly were all gathered beneath a very large tree close to where they’d parked the cart, grinning at each other and pointing to the top of the tree. Curious, Beau got to her feet and walked over them.

“What’s goin on?” She asked, looking up to see if there was anything interesting in the branches.

“We were just debating who would be able to reach the top of this tree the quickest,” Molly said smoothly, flashing a grin at Nott. “Obviously, it would be the person with the longest legs.”

“In your _dreams_.” Nott scoffed. “I could get all the way to the top before you even get up the first branch.”

“This a challenge?” Beau asked, grinning.

“It’s a _race_,” Jester said, looking at them all with a devilish smirk. “Okay, three two one GO!”

With no other warning, she jumped up to grab onto the first branch, kicking her feet to find purchase. The rest of them startled before quickly recovering, shouting out in protest before racing for the tree themselves. Nott and Molly ended up going for the same branch, immediately getting tangled up in one another and trying to pull the other off the branch with little concern for safety.

Beau, meanwhile, jumped for the same branch Jester was clambering onto, running up the trunk to gather momentum before landing on top of the branch, winking at Jester before she moved up to the next one.

“Noooo, Beau!” Jester called out, but Beau was already moving, nimbly climbing up from branch to branch.

When she was about halfway up she looked over her shoulder, seeing Nott had managed to break away from Molly, the both of them now making their way up the tree on their own. Jester was making good progress despite being no natural tree climber, a determined look on her face as she kept going.

Beau reached the top about half a minute before Nott did, sticking her tongue out at the goblin, who insisted she would’ve won if ‘Molly hadn’t _cheated_’, a declaration that earned Nott two middle fingers and almost got both her and Beau the pleasure of seeing Molly fall out of the tree on account of both of his hands letting go of the branches he was holding onto.

“C’mon Jester, you can do it!” Beau called down.

“Oh, no encouragement for me?” Molly shouted up, apparently giving up on climbing to the very top of the tree and satisfying himself with finding a branch he could lie down on.

“Nah, you can fall, I don’t care,” Beau said, smirking as Molly rolled his eyes dramatically.

“I’m coming, I’m coming!” Jester shouted, huffing a little from the exertion.

Having won the race already, Beau climbed down a few branches until she was slightly below Jester, watching her exhale heavily.

“Climbing trees is _hard_.” She whined, sitting down on the branch was currently on, leaning against the trunk.

“Oh yeah, it takes years of training.” Beau drawled, settling down on a branch as well and enjoying the view. “You still got pretty high, though.”

“I did, didn’t I.” Jester puffed out her chest a bit, looking down and waving at their temporary camp “Hello! Fjord! Yasha! Caleb! Look at us!”

The three who had decided not to risk their limbs by climbing up a tree all looked up, ranging from amused to mostly indifferent. They all waved back at least, if only a little bit.

Beau felt the corner of her mouth curl up, something that happened more and more often while Jester was around. She was just so exuberant, so bright, it was hard not to let her happiness rub off on you at least a little. But Beau had been around plenty of happy, exuberant people and just been annoyed at them. Jester was different.

There was a rustling of branches and a swooshing sound, and then suddenly Jester was hanging upside down, her face only a few inches away from Beau, grinning wildly.

“Surprise!” Jester shouted, her arms dangling.“I’ve always wanted to do this!”

Beau’s eyes widened and she nearly fell backward, surprised at the sudden tiefling in her face. Jester began to giggle while Beau’s arms windmilled behind her, grabbing onto other branches to stop from falling.

“Sorry, Beau!” Jester said between giggles, seemingly hardly able to control herself while all her blood probably rushed to her head. “Did- did I scare you?”

Beau recovered herself, first smiling wryly before she saw the goofy look on Jester’s face, only amplified by the fact that she was upside down. She tried to stifle her laughter by covering her mouth, but this only made Jester laugh more.

“I did! I got you!” Jester exclaimed, swinging back and forth a little bit but making no move to get right-side up.

“You did _not _scare me, you startled me. There’s a difference.” Beau said, still smiling, before pausing. “Are you stuck?”

“Definitely not,” Jester said firmly, reaching up for the branch with her arms only to fall back down again.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m fine!” Jester insisted, trying again. Beau raised an eyebrow, feeling laughter threatening to bubble up again when she finally huffed in defeat.

“Okay, I’m stuck.”

* * *

_“I like her ridiculous plans.”_

* * *

“Uh, where are you going with those?” Beau leaned out of the door to the Xhorhaus, where she had just seen Jester walk through with a cloth-covered basket in hand, Nugget nipping at her heels. “Follow-up question, what’s in the basket?”

“I’m teaching Nugget a new trick!” Jester announced proudly, and now Beau was curious, jogging out to catch up with her as they walked to the backyard.

“What are you teaching him?”

Jester smiled widely at her, before launching into a quick explanation. “Okay, okay, so while I was out getting some pastries I saw this guy in the street and he had this like, big lizard and he would play a song on this flute and the lizard would get up on like, it’s back legs and then do this cool little dance-” She did a little shimmy on the spot to represent the dance, before launching back into the explanation. “- and it looked so cool so I was like, ‘how did you teach him to do that?’ And the guy said he trained him with treats _so _I bought a bunch of extra treats!”

Beau blinked before nodding. “Okay, what treats exactly?”

“Muffins,” Jester said smugly, removing a part of the cloth to show off the basket filled with different flavours of muffins.

“Can dogs eat those?” Beau asked, one eyebrow raised.

Jester stopped, the two of them having reached the approximate centre of the backyard. “I mean, I’ve fed him a lot of pastries and he seems okay soooo~”

“Of course, of course,” Beau said, already interested to see how this would go. “Want some help?”

Jester’s face lit up, and she passed the basket to Beau, selecting a muffin and holding it up. “Okay! Nugget!”

Nugget, who had been eagerly following until now for the promise of food, stood to attention, nose sniffing the air and tongue lolling out of his. Jester waved the muffin in the air and he followed it, his tail thumping repetitively on the ground.

“Dance!” Jester called out, shaking her hips a bit and holding the muffin up high. Nugget watched for a moment, head tilted slightly, before he jumped into the air, snatching the muffin out of Jester’s hands and almost taking a couple of her fingers with it.

Jester yelped and jumped back, only to plant her hands on her hips and scowl once she recovered from the shock. “Nugget! No!”

Nugget was too busy chomping on a muffin to notice the admonishment, and Beau snorted. “Jes, maybe you need to build up to it.”

Jester looked at her, folding her arms and looking thoughtful for a moment. “Maybe he needs music. The lizard had music.”

“I don’t know if music is the problem,” Beau said, though when Jester ran back inside the house and came back with a tiny piccolo, she shrugged her shoulders. Music it was, then.

“Okay, Beau, I’ll play music and you can hold the muffin and dance so he knows what to do!” Jester said, bouncing on her heels.

“Wait, dance?” Beau asked. “You want me to dance?”

“Yeah! Or _you _could play the music and I dance.” Jester said, her eyes widening. “Can you play music?”

“I _can_, but I only know like, one song,” Beau said, not wanting to admit that the last time she’d played music had been… years ago. Jester pushed the piccolo at her anyway, taking the basket. She looked so eager, and it _was _better than dancing (though to be honest, if Jester had really asked her to do that, she probably would’ve said yes), so she fondly rolled her eyes before beginning to play.

It was far from perfect, and her old music teacher would have a fit, but Jester didn’t seem to mind, calling out to Nugget while holding another muffin up and doing another odd shimmy dance, which Beau could only assume was an approximation of the dance she’d seen the lizard do.

Beau could hardly keep the song going from how many times she had to stop to stifle her laughter, Jester giggling as her ‘dancing’ became more ridiculous as time wore on. A few of the others walked by or opened their windows to see what was going on, only to raise their eyebrows or stare before going back inside, chuckling or mumbling about no sunlight making them all lose their minds.

Nugget never really got the hang of dancing, but he did get to eat lots and lots of muffins, and Jester refused to call her plan a complete failure.

“It was really fun, at least.” She said, still beaming as she passed Beau one of the few muffins left in the basket.

“It was.” Beau accepted the muffin. “I should play music more often.”

“You should, it was really good.”

Beau snorted. “It was _not_, like every note was off-key.”

Jester giggled, covering her mouth to stop muffing from spraying out, swallowing before continuing. “That’s what made it fun!”

* * *

“_I think she’s complicated and layered.”_

* * *

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Beau had said that. She’d really fucking said that. And she’d meant it.

She sucked in a deep breath, walking back down to her cabin, still feeling the warmth of Jester’s arms around her despite the chill of the night air. She said she’d loved Jester, and Jester had said it back.

Platonically, of course, but still. There were precious few people that Beau had ever said ‘I love you.’ to, and even fewer that had said it back and meant it. Now Jester was one of those people.

There was a tingling in her gut that refused to settle down even as she went to bed, listening to the lapping of the waves and feeling the rocking of the boat on the ocean.

It all just felt surreal. Even just a year ago she never would have imagined doing anything like this. Meeting anyone like the Mighty Nein. Like Jester.

She looked over to the hammock that Jester had claimed as her own, on the opposite side of the cabin that all the women of the Mighty Nein shared. It was empty, and minutes passed but Jester didn’t come down to fill it.

Beau just hoped that her talk had done something helpful. Jester was always so optimistic, so energetic, but there were cracks in that persona, and Beau could see it. She cheered up everyone else so much, almost at the expense of herself.

As someone who tended to bring the mood of those around her _down_, Beau couldn’t understand why she would do that to herself. But she could understand that it was hurting her.

Jester seemed to feel a little better by the end of it, at least, and that was what Beau had set out to do. To make her feel better, and maybe let her know that negative emotions weren’t all bad. Dairon had given her a lecture once on how anything, anger, sadness, fear, determination, all of it could be useful if given the right direction and not simply released wildly or hidden away to fester and rot.

Of course, they’d been talking about punching someone, but that lesson could probably be applied elsewhere, right?

There was a lot that Jester seemed to hide, despite all that she was happy to share. Perhaps that was why all of them, herself included, hadn’t noticed anything amiss for so long. Jester was happy to tell them all about her past, her mother, her god, her powers, her hopes, and her dreams. All the soft and pleasant things.

There was so much more to Jester, and Beau found herself drawn to it. She didn’t want to see Jester hurting, wished she could tell her that there was probably very little Jester could do or say that would change her opinion of her. She loved her, platonically (or maybe not entirely) and Beau was pretty sure she’d do just about anything for her.

Beau stared up at the ceiling of the cabin, and when Jester finally came down and went to bed, she waited until she could hear her breathing evenly before taking a look, seeing a calm, peaceful expression on her face and finally relaxing.

* * *

_“I dunno.”_

* * *

Alcohol buzzed in her brain, dulling the panic and butterflies that were swirling in her stomach. Everyone was getting ready for bed, piling up on either one of the two beds already in the room or curling up on their bedrolls on the floor. Nott and Caleb had one of the beds, and Caduceus had the other.

Jester had automatically dragged her bedroll next to Beau’s.

Beau glanced over at Nott, who was giving what she probably assumed to be extremely subtle thumbs-ups and suggestive winks, while Beau just glared back in response, mouthing for her to _not say a fucking word_.

She shouldn’t have told Nott. Everything could be kept simple and orderly and neat as long as she didn’t tell anybody but she had. Nott had _promised _not to tell anyone but honestly, Beau sincerely doubted her ability to keep a secret like this away from Jester very long. All it would take is one little slip-up and Jester would probably catch it (she was so observant sometimes) and needle her about it until Nott broke down and confessed because how could she lie to Jester for too long?

If that happened, Beau probably wouldn’t even be too mad at Nott. Jester just had that effect on people. 

Pointedly ignoring Nott’s gaze, Beau went about the normal routine of going to bed, lying poorly about how many drinks she’d had and insisting she wasn’t going to throw up anytime soon.

“I still have enough magic for a lesser restoration if you want,” Jester said quietly, but Beau just shook her head.

“Don’t use your magic for that.” She mumbled. “Not worth it.”

“If you’re sure.” Jester had been subdued the whole day, especially since her encounter with the Gentleman, and not even the pep talks that she and some of the others had given her had done much to get her out of it. “G’night, Beau.”

“Night, Jes.” Beau made to reach a hand over to rest it on Jester’s shoulder, or squeeze her hand, or something, but she hesitated.

Instead, she burrowed into her own bedroll, thinking far too hard about the distance between them and everything she’d said to Nott echoing in her head.

She shouldn’t have said anything. Speaking it out loud made it real, admitting it made it almost an actual tangible _thing_, and that was so much harder than when it was just emotions and fantasies crowding her brain. It made everything feel more… consequential.

She could never say anything, could never risk it. Jester was too good in a hundred different ways, and her friendship with her was too important to risk messing with.

It would be alright, in the end. She wouldn’t do anything, she wouldn’t say anything else, she’d make sure Nott kept her mouth shut, Jester would never find out and they’d remain best friends where everything still made sense and everything was great. The ‘what if’s’ wouldn’t matter. The possibilities wouldn’t matter.

She rolled over so that she was facing away from Jester, even though she was painfully aware of her presence less than a foot away, and she fell asleep dreaming of a world where the possibilities were real and there was nothing in her way.

**Author's Note:**

> [incoherent screaming] WE DID IT GANG 
> 
> i literyally sobbed like oh my god can u bellieve it i cant sisoiidjdoiijddjoofioijfkjbgkhgb AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
> 
> anyway i could go on for hours about how absolutely dead i am but HAHHHHHHHHHH


End file.
